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Windstorm and Flood Damages

Windstorm and Flood Damages

Guiding Businesses and Residents in Recovery After a Catastrophic Event

Miami, Ft. Lauderdale and West Palm Beach homes and businesses are continually subjected to harsh weather elements. Wind, flood, rain, tropical storms and hurricanes are a fact of life in South Florida that can destroy property and interrupt business operations. Your insurance is supposed to help you absorb the risks of catastrophic events. However, when the time comes to collect compensation for your losses, your insurance company may block or delay your recovery. These actions can put your home or business in jeopardy during the challenging aftermath of a major storm.

Saavedra Goodwin is a boutique firm established in Ft. Lauderdale in 1988. Our Broward County property damage attorneys have assisted businesses, homeowners and condominium associations throughout South Florida and other areas of the country with complex insurance issues for the past 25 years. Many of our cases involve the unpredictable and unforgiving natural conditions — including windstorms and floods — that accompany serious weather events.

Coverage for South Florida’s Extreme Weather

Windstorm and flood insurance are forms of weather insurance. Often the events occur together during a tropical storm, hurricane or storm surge and yet your policy may restrict coverage of one or another peril and complicate recovery.

The mortgage on your home or commercial property may require you to carry flood insurance if you are located in a flood zone . However, your property may be subject to flooding even on higher ground in a low-risk area during a catastrophic storm.

Our Broward County property damage attorneys help clients recover from their private insurer and FEMA’s National Flood Insurance Program. Our team protects your interests in light of such common policy provisions as ensuing loss and concurrent causation. We pursue the maximum possible compensation available under your policy terms and fight your insurer’s efforts to reduce your rightful payments.

Ensuing Loss Provisions

Many business and homeowners’ policies contain ensuing loss language that clarifies coverage of a covered loss arising after an excluded peril. An ensuing loss — or resulting loss — that is not otherwise excluded in the policy remains covered, even if an excluded peril triggers the chain of events that causes the loss. Our lawyers are adept at advocating clear arguments, backed by persuasive evidence, supported by experts, to demonstrate causation and your right to recovery for the loss.

Concurrent and Anti-Concurrent Causation Provisions

Concurrent and anti-concurrent causation clauses address destruction caused by two perils. If your losses are proximately caused by two separate perils, one that is covered and the other excluded, a concurrent causation clause permits recovery for losses. Conversely, an anti-concurrent clause bars your recovery for the damages.

For example, during a tropical storm, debris may fly through your window and permit torrents of rain to gush in from above while the overflowing drainage system may allow water to seep into your establishment from below. If your policy covers rain and wind damage, but not flooding, you may still recover for your losses under a concurrent causation provision of your policy. However, your insurance company may attempt to withhold approval of your claim for the resulting water damage if your policy contains an anti-concurrent causation clause.

Learn More About Recovering Damages

When a major natural event damages your property, take immediate action to recover your rightful insurance compensation. Learn more about how Saavedra Goodwin strategizes a plan of action to prove your claim. Call our law firm at 954.767.6333 or contact us online to speak with our Broward County property damage attorneys.